14. Alira
Alira
Tessa is at the top of the stairs on the other side of the old wooden door. I can hear her as she gives orders to some knights who are passing through. Sounds echo awfully down here. Even the scurrying of mice travels like they are right beneath my bed.
How many hours have already passed? I wonder as I stare at the stone ceiling.
My eyes lower to my hands. If only I had my sword or…
No. Not even a sword would be able to cut through these bars.
They aren’t made with typical metal; they’ve been reinforced with fragments of devilstones, I think.
That would explain why I feel so drained of energy the longer I sit here.
I would need magic to break out of here, and lots of it, more than any demigod could hold.
The only other time I’ve encountered the devilstone has been on the journey here, when a few rogue knights attacked me, and when the woman attacked me at the wedding ceremony…
but it’s a common theme that the demons aren’t lacking in their supply of it.
At least not as much as the demigods believe to be the case.
I stand and walk across the cell, wrapping both of my hands around the bars to see if I can get a glimpse of whether there are any guards down the corridor.
Both sides are clear, but I hear a faint sound. Footsteps.
I press my face against the steel, and within a few seconds, I see the same goddess with raven hair from the vision, except in the flesh this time.
Minerva.
She’s dressed in warrior armor; the metal practically glows even though it’s dark down here. It’s hard to look at; she practically illuminates the dungeon. Beneath her armor, she wears a creamy ivory robe that falls behind her shoulders and casts all the shadows away with each step she takes.
A god in the flesh. I don’t realize I’m holding my breath until my head starts to feel dizzy.
“You can get out of there if you really want to,” she says simply, as if I haven’t been thinking about it this entire time.
“Minerva, I do not have the type of power that is used for breaking metal like this. I can turn demons into flowers, and I have gilded blood that I can heal myself with. But I cannot break these bars; they hum with devilstone somewhere deep within them.” I turn away and press my back against the bars, sliding until my butt hits the ground and curl into myself, staring at the stone wall on the other side of my cell.
Minerva lets out a soft laugh. “Fine, I suppose you have a point.”
I hear the bars bend, and I quickly stand and turn to face her. She has bent one of them enough for me to slip through the gap.
“Take me outside the castle. I need to get back to the palace.” I don’t leave room for discussion. I have to unearth a skull with my bare hands to see the truth of what Kalel and his kingdom have done.
“You demigods really are stubborn, you know that?” She says it with a smile and a gentle voice.
I wonder how long it’s been since she’s spoken to a demigod herself.
She seems quite curious about what will become of us.
Mercury did tell me that the gods are playing games.
I wonder which side she is on—what ending she is anticipating for the demigods.
“We are stubborn because we are not gods like you. We die, we bleed, we suffer.” I let my eyes move over the prisoners in King Achill’s cells. How hopeless they are, and quiet. Even in the presence of a goddess, they hardly seem aware enough to even notice. I wish to end their pain.
“I was going to have you go back to the garden anyway,” she says, heading up the stairs.
“You were? I thought you wanted me to get out of Devicit and take down the veil.” I move as swiftly as I can up the stairs behind her, keeping close in case we run into trouble.
I’m not exactly sure what she plans on doing with Tessa, but we’ll have to deal with that when we get there.
“Why are you helping me? What do you gain from this?” I ask warily.
“How do you think you’re supposed to accomplish that? It has to be from within. I have my reasons. Aiding an old friend, you could say.” Her voice doesn’t falter once.
My legs stop moving and my heart twists.
“I can’t bring down the veil. Everyone in the kingdom…
in Devicit, they will all perish without its safety.
I can’t have all their blood on my hands.
Even if they survive the war, what about the gods?
Isn’t their wrath for them the very reason the demons erected the veil to begin with?
” Just talking about it brings me back to the bloodshed in the time loops. I’d never seen such massacre and ruin.
“You will understand once we get to the palace, demigod. You would be surprised at the things we do when the truth is revealed. When we are pushed into a corner,” she says knowingly.
I half wonder if she’s on a timeline because she seems to be walking at a quick pace, as if she needs me to be somewhere at a certain time.
I didn’t know the gods worked on timetables as we did.
But maybe the Fates aren’t kind to them either.
We reach the top of the stairs, and Minerva waits for thirty seconds before opening the door slowly.
She pokes her head out and then steps into the hallway in one fluid motion.
I’m shocked when she does, but I realize there’s no one standing there anymore.
Tessa is gone and the corridor is oddly vacant, although voices echo from other areas of the castle.
“How did you know she wouldn’t be there?” I whisper, glancing both ways before quickly following behind Minerva.
“I am wise. And I have seen this day many, many times with the help of the Fates. It’s all based on keeping the time.” She winks at me.
Her saying that reminds me of the time loops and how I got used to everything that would happen at certain times. Each axe thrown and every sword swung. The opponents I faced were the same at different time points, but no matter what I did to change the events, the outcome was always the same.
We quickly make it out of the castle unseen, using the same passageway that Nikolai brought me through.
Everyone seems to be so busy running around.
Knights are preparing the castle for sheltering civilians, laying down blankets in some of the halls and barricading some of the side doors leading to the gardens in the east wing.
Maids are trying to get food rationed out into boxes and stored in different rooms. It’s so chaotic that nobody even notices us as we slip into the night.
Minerva goes with me to the edge of King Achill’s property and then stops abruptly.
She looks down at me, her eyes smooth with knowledge beyond all reason.
“You must go the rest of the way yourself. I will be waiting for you at the Blood Knight’s palace, in the gardens.
There you will have your proof, and you must make your decision, Alira. ”
“Wait,” I whisper, grabbing her wrist. She turns and gives me a curious look. “How are you able to be inside the veil? I thought it protected them against the gods.”
She smiles and lifts the laurel leaf from her pocket. “You brought me in with you. Now go, there’s not much time.”
Her words linger with me long after she fades into the evening air. The trees above shake with an ominous chill chattering through their leaves.
I try not to linger, and I make quick work of moving through the alleyways, trying to stick to the back routes so that I don’t bump into anybody. Luckily, it’s just as it was when I was taken to the castle; the streets are practically empty.
The veil crackles above and draws my eyes upward, stopping me dead in my tracks. What was that? My heart races. Are the demigods attacking the veil and actually damaging it?
I take a turn down another alley, where voices approach and catch me off guard. The voices are coming from around a brick corner between two small workshops. A tinkerer and a blacksmith. Rain dribbles down on the people speaking in hushed tones from the small roofs overhead, but they pay no mind.
I manage to get close enough and hide without them seeing me. The blacksmith shop has plenty of barrels and tables out front to hide behind. I kneel and ignore the dirty water soaking into my beautiful dress. It’s already ruined, but keeping it nice is the last thing on my mind.
“Nik, before we go any farther, I have to confess to you what I’ve done. I can’t set her free without you knowing, because it’s something I must tell her too. It’s bad. Really fucking bad. She will never forgive me.”
Kalel?
My eyes widen, and I smother my mouth to keep the gasp from alerting them to my hiding spot. Kalel’s breaths are uneven, and his eyes are filled with misery. Even the dim lighting from the moon couldn’t keep his turmoil hidden. I watch with dread building in my stomach.
“I…fuck.” Kalel’s voice drops, and he sounds like he’s going to admit to a terrible crime.
My heart races, and tears are threatening to fall already. It can’t be worse than the flowers.
When Kalel can’t bring himself to say more, Nikolai places his hand on his friend’s shoulder. “Just let it out, Kalel. Whatever has been eating away at you has been devouring you from the inside for a while now.”
Kalel swallows and drops his head with shame.
“You remember the night of Thornhall as well as I do.” Nikolai nods in confirmation, his brows threading with worry about where this is heading.
“That night, in my grief and rage, I called upon Pluto, and I prayed for a curse on the knight who led the demigods into that innocent village.”
What?
There were many things I was expecting him to say, but that wasn’t one of them.
Nikolai’s as confused as I am. “Commander, what are you talking about? What does that have to do with anything?”
Kalel’s jaw flexes, and he shakes his head. “It has everything to do with the mess we’re in… It was a time-loop curse.”
Chills erupt over my skin, and a pit drops in my gut. I feel like I can’t breathe. The rain silences the world around me, and all I hear is the pain in his voice as he confesses his sins to Nikolai.
“I killed that knight twenty times over. I took out my revenge until I figured out who the demigod was.” He swallows the guilt in his tone and chokes out, “It was Alira, and I had killed her. Time and time again… The gods are devious. They are cruel. If I had never set the curse upon her, she would’ve been dead after the first battle in Alzhor, and we would’ve taken their kingdom and been done with all of this.
Don’t you see? We are only under siege now because the loop reset until she altered their fate. And now…”
He regrets the curse…because of my being here. My chest caves in on itself.
Nikolai’s face is unreadable, but the tension rolls from his shoulders. “Now we have a demigod inside the veil. One that can control the dragons. One that you’ve wronged terribly.” He takes a step away from Kalel, shaking his head and cursing under his breath.
Kalel’s eyes narrow with misery, and he nods. “We cannot let her find out about any of this. That’s why I’m not sure we can let her out. Not yet anyway, but I need you to keep her safe, Nik. I’ll speak with the king, and once we ensure the Alzhorians aren’t a threat, she will be free.”
Nikolai takes a few more steps back, dragging his hand down his jaw. “Kalel, what have you done? How could you do this to her? Alira…if she finds out about the flowers—”
“I know,” Kalel bites out. His hair is wet, and a few strands run down his forehead with the increasing rainfall. “She might be able to bring the veil down.”
I physically collapse backward and barely manage to prop myself back up. My muscles are weak and drained from the pure emotion that rushes through me.
Everything Minerva said is true about the flowers, but she didn’t tell me he’s the one who cursed me…
After all the turmoil I went through. The self-loathing and shame.
The guilt. The suffering of dying at his hand over and over and over because I thought I had deserved such a cruel fate… and it was him all along.
It was Kalel who hurt me unyieldingly.
I curl into a ball, wrapping my arms around my legs and hugging them close. My pink dress is drenched with rain and tattered from the streets and thorns.
“I’ll go stay with her… Commander?” Nikolai says as he takes a few steps away, back facing Kalel.
My husband looks up, his eyes weary.
“You…really are the monster they say you are. Expect my resignation after this battle. I’d rather live as a mage’s apprentice or in the cities of men than in a kingdom of stolen power.
A kingdom run by men like you who have more bodies in their attics than anyone else.
I’d rather be free and follow Alira like a dog, even if she never returns my affection, rather than another moment under this reign. Under your profound evil.”
They are both silent for several stretched-out seconds.
“Very well,” Kalel says with a steady tone. “Thank you, Nik.”
Nikolai doesn’t reply to that; he only walks forward and doesn’t look back.
Kalel stays a moment longer, sighing and tilting his chin toward the veil. He stares up and shuts his eyes, letting the rain kiss his cheeks.
Then he looks back toward the street leading to the square, where I’m guessing the king is, and walks ahead. Kalel was firm in his choice of speaking with Achill first. He wants to save both his kingdom and me, but it’s an impossible task.
He’s made his choice.
I’m left alone in the dark alley with a throbbing heart and more rage than I’ve ever felt in my entire life. Tears burn down my cheeks, and once I’m sure they’re both far away enough and not coming back, I let out a painful cry that is swept away by the rain.